This is an explanation of the first logic game from Section I of LSAT Preptest 31, the June 2000 LSAT.
Five adjacent lockers (1, 2, 3, 4, 5) will be assigned to seven students. There are four boys – Fred, Juan, Marc, and Paul (F, J, M, P) – and three girls – Nita, Rachel, and Trisha (N, R, T). You must determine the assignments of the lockers based on the rules.
Game Setup
This game is a combination of grouping and linear. There are seven students, but only five lockers. So some students go together.
I’m going to combine the rules as I go through them. I’ve never found it useful to write out the rules separately without thinking about how they can be combined. Wastes time and space.
The two shared lockers have a girl and a boy (rule 2). There are only three girls: N, R and T.
R can’t share a locker (rule 3). That means that N and T must share lockers.
This is very important, so I’ll repeat it: N and T must share lockers, because R can’t.
This is especially interesting because of rule 4: Since N and T can’t be beside each other, the two shared lockers can’t be beside each other.
I left out the first half of rule 3: Juan must share a locker. Since we figured out N and T are the two girls who share lockers, J must share a locker with one of them. I drew it like this:
It’s also a good idea to draw symbols to remind yourself that R is alone and N and T aren’t beside each other:
The last rule tells us F has locker 3. It’s best to draw this directly on your diagram:
It can be useful to draw the list of variables. Though hopefully from their names you’ll be able to figure out who is a boy and girl without checking the list:
There are no rules for M and P. They could share lockers, but they don’t have to. And they can go anywhere.
This is a very open ended game. Focus on F, J, R and N and T.
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